Fat Tuesday/Ash Wednesday: Sin Today; Repent Tomorrow

The day before yesterday was “Fat Tuesday,” the last day of ‘Mardi Gras’—a ‘holiday’ devoted to overindulgence, revelry, and sinning as much as possible. The debauchery culminates on Tuesday before Ash Wednesday—a day of repentance—followed by Lent, 46 days of self-denial.

Any ‘real’ Christian recognizes the hypocrisy and outright foolishness of a day of deliberate sinning, followed by a day of repenting. But in our amoral culture, immature believers may be easily deceived by the spirit of “Mardi Gras.” In his letter to the Romans, after teaching them about God’s unlimited grace for the forgiveness of sin, Paul asks the rhetorical question: “Well then [since we have so much grace], should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more kindness and forgiveness?" (6:1, NLT) Paul answers his own question with a resounding “Absolutely NOT,” asserting that Christians are dead to sin, and cannot possibly return to it any more than a dead person can come back to life.

Unfortunately, the spirit of “Mardi Gras” manifests itself in the Church! Immature believers take advantage of God’s grace by overindulging in some area of their life, saying ‘tomorrow I am going to deal with this sinful habit?’ Young persons, especially, are tempted to hold on to the “fun” years of their lives, thinking they can wait until they are older to become serious about their Christian walk.

Most of you reading this will not identify yourself as either young or immature. But you may want to rethink how the spirit of “Mardi Gras” may be affecting you. What spirit was in operation when you said to yourself “I know it's wrong to have another piece of chocolate pie; but I’ll make up for it tomorrow”?